Andrea Stella: "The team and drivers did a great job today to come away with a double podium in this morning's Sprint and a 1-2 result in Qualifying for tomorrow's Grand Prix, with both Lando and Oscar delivering superb pace.
"This morning's Sprint race didn't deliver quite the result we wanted with Oscar taking second and Lando third, but it has put us in good condition to make some improvements ahead of tomorrow's race.
"The weather will certainly play its part on race day, as is so often the case here in Spa, and both Red Bull and Ferrari have made improvements today which will put us under pressure from the start. The whole team will make sure we are in the best position possible to finish the weekend with a victory and more valuable points in both championships."
Laurent Mekies: It was a very positive start to the day with a win in the Sprint. This was down to the enormous effort from everyone in the factory to deliver key upgrades, and from there it was an incredible job from Max. He had only one shot to make the move on Oscar and he nailed it, after that it was a masterclass of defence and tyre management, well supported by the Team. Qualifying was a smooth session but nowhere near perfect and it was certainly a little bit more difficult to extract everything from the car for Max. This is something for us as a Team to look at. The gap to McLaren is probably fair, it is reflecting the reality and it is still a bit frustrating to miss out. For Yuki it was a really positive step forward this weekend and it is good to see him in Q3. He progressed very well, and his best Qualifying result for the Team should give him a good boost of confidence. We upgraded his car just before Qualifying, giving him the same updated floor as Max, although not the same front wing. A big thank you for the huge effort from the crew to get that car ready on time. We will fight from P4 and P7 tomorrow and everything is to play for. We will see what the weather is like, we are not desperate for rain but we have made choices on the car to prepare for variable weather. The rain is probably the best chance to mix up the cards and to get closer to McLaren but if it's a drier day we will still take the fight and it will be down to how we play the game and tyre management.
Sprint Race: Charles and Lewis started on Medium tyres, as did all bar one of the drivers. Charles went with a used set, Lewis with a new one. On the opening lap Charles moved up one place to third, making the most of a tow from Lando Norris. On lap 4 Norris regained the position, as Charles had dropped out of range of Piastri's DRS. Lewis was trapped in a DRS train and could only make up two places, to finish 16th. The team gathered useful data for tomorrow's race.
Q1: Charles made it into Q2 with the 6th fastest time. Lewis's last run was good enough for seventh behind his team-mate. Unfortunately, he had his lap time deleted for exceeding track limits at Raidillon and he missed the cut to Q2. He will start from 16th on the grid.
Q2: Like many other drivers, Charles set his best time on his first run and was unable to improve on his second attempt. Charles comfortably made the cut to Q3, setting the fourth fastest time.
Q3: In a closely contested session, Charles produced a very strong lap to ensure he will start tomorrow's Grand Prix from third place on the second row of the grid.
Fred Vasseur: Charles did a very good lap at the end. Currently we are still working on getting the most out of the new package we brought here and there was real improvement over the course of the weekend from the start all the way to the final lap in qualifying. We learned more about the car from session to session. Rain is expected tomorrow that will also allow us to see how these upgrades work in all conditions. We are still a couple of tenths behind McLaren but we are on the pace of Verstappen. We will continue to work on improving still further for Budapest.
As for Lewis, he was unable to put everything together but the field is so close, a matter of just hundredths or even thousandths of a second between the cars. His pace was good, he was just one place behind Charles but the track limits put him out and it is what it is. It's true that it's been a tough weekend for him so far and, at this track, you need to build up confidence lap after lap and with the problems yesterday and today that was made difficult for him.
George Russell qualified P6 with Kimi Antonelli P18 for Sunday's Belgian Grand Prix. Saturday began with the F1 Sprint; George starting P13 with Kimi P19 after both drivers were hampered in Sprint Qualifying on Friday.
In a quiet race, George made up one position to come home P12 with Kimi advancing two positions to P17.
Qualifying proved a tricky affair too with the car struggling for the pace needed to fight for the front two rows of the grid. In Q1, both drivers improved on their final efforts but Kimi was unfortunately knocked out in P18. George meanwhile progressed to Q3 but could only manage P6 on his last run. Tomorrow's forecast is mixed with potential rain throughout the day.
Toto Wolff, Team Principal & CEO: As a team, this weekend has fallen far below our standards so far. It has been our weakest performance this year and we need to quickly understand why. We have struggled with a car facing several balance limitations, losing the vast majority of our lap time in the middle sector. We knew we would struggle to get into the points in the Sprint given our starting positions, so focused on improving these balance issues for Qualifying. Unfortunately, we couldn't make sufficient headway and suffered as a result.
With a mixed weather forecast for tomorrow's race, we will be looking to take advantage of any opportunities that come our way. We are not fooling ourselves though; the pace of our car has not been sufficient this weekend to challenge at the front and that is unlikely to change tomorrow. We will race hard to maximise our result but must ensure we start the weekend in a much stronger position in Budapest next week.
Andrew Shovlin, Trackside Engineering Director: That was another disappointing day for us here in Spa. We were looking to bounce back from a tough Friday, knowing that the big points were still on offer ahead of us. Starting from outside the top 10 in the Sprint, we knew that progress would be difficult to achieve. The low wing levels being run here result in a modest DRS effect and other than Kimi making one pass, we were unable to make any further overtakes.
We made quite significant changes to our car for Qualifying but the underlying limitations were still there and neither driver had good confidence in the rear end. Kimi was eliminated in the first cut; George did a good job to get as far as P6 but it's clear we have to get to the bottom of the issues with the car as it simply wasn't quick. We're expecting some rain for the race tomorrow. Considering our starting positions that's a good thing, and hopefully both drivers can move forward if we operate well, but our bigger focus is to understand why our pace has been so poor at this track.
Andy Cowell, CEO & Team Principal: "A challenging day here in Spa. We knew heading into the Sprint it would be difficult to score points as both Lance and Fernando started further down the field. Unfortunately, the race then didn't offer any opportunities to move forward.
"In Qualifying, both cars sadly didn't make it out of Q1. While we made slight adjustments to the set-up in anticipation of rain tomorrow, fundamentally we just didn't have the pace today. With a wet race forecast, there's still a lot to play for. We'll make the most of any opportunities that come our way and fight hard to score points."
MoneyGram Haas F1 Team drivers Esteban Ocon and Ollie Bearman started Saturday morning at Circuit de Spa-Francorchamps with the 15-lap Sprint - the third of six planned Sprint weekends on the 2025 FIA Formula 1 World Championship schedule - with Ocon finishing fifth and Bearman seventh.
In a largely processional Sprint, both drivers were able to convert their grid positions into race results, managing tire wear after starting the Sprint on used Pirelli P Zero Yellow medium tires. A total of six points from Ocon and Bearman marked the first time MoneyGram Haas F1 Team has finished in the points at Circuit de Spa-Francorchamps since 2018.
Saturday afternoon then saw Ocon and Bearman back in action to qualify for Sunday's Belgian Grand Prix - the duo narrowly missing out on participating in the top 10 shootout.
Bearman led Ocon in Q1, securing P5 on the timesheets with a 1:41.617, while Ocon graduated into Q2 courtesy of a 1:41.884, placing him P14. Ocon missed getting into the final stage of qualifying by two hundredths of a second, the Frenchman's lap of 1:41.525 securing P11. Bearman finished the session directly behind his team-mate, the British rookie recording an identical time to his previous session - 1:41.617 - for P12.
Ayao Komatsu, Team Principal: "The Sprint was very good; we wanted to convert our starting positions of P5 and P7 into results, and we finished exactly there. Six points is an amazing result. For qualifying, we had to consider the weather for tomorrow as there's a high chance it's going to rain. It's tricky to decide direction, so we split listening to driver feedback to cover the widest range as a team. It's frustrating and a bit deflating right now because we have speed. We lost out getting to Q3 by a tiny margin to Albon and he qualified P5, so I feel that's where our potential is. The good thing is, with Ollie's set-up especially, he's very confident and our target is double points again."
James Vowles, Team Principal: What a fantastic day all-round. This morning, with Carlos finishing P6 in the Sprint Race, demonstrating good performance across the two days, and this afternoon with Alex securing P5, our best Qualifying result since Vegas last year.
We made some improvements to the car since yesterday, working mostly well. I think with Carlos, there's an interesting quirk with Sprint Qualifying sessions in that you must use a set of Soft tyres in SQ3. This meant that in Q2 today, we had to use one used and one new set of tyres. Then, as the track warmed up, he struggled to find the same lap time as we had previously.
I'm optimistic for tomorrow and look forward to it. I think the weather conditions could play a part but we're in a strong position with two strong drivers.
Today saw a turnaround for the main players in yesterday's Sprint Qualifying in which Oscar Piastri set a new track record on his way to pole. Today's Sprint race was won by Max Verstappen (Red Bull Racing), the Dutchman thus recording his 12th victory in this discipline. Behind him came the McLaren duo of Piastri and Lando Norris, in that order. But the Englishman got his revenge in qualifying, taking pole for tomorrow's race, beating the Australian, second once again, by a whisker. There were no lap records today, as Lando's time of 1'40"562 was 52 thousandths slower than Piastri's from yesterday. More important is the 85 thousandths that separates the McLaren pair today.
Starting from the second row will be Charles Leclerc (1'40"900) and Verstappen, just three thousandths slower than the Ferrari driver. This was Norris' 13th career pole, the fifth this season. For McLaren it was number 12 in the Belgian Grand Prix. It's the first time it heads the field since 2012, when another Englishman, Jenson Button, was quickest in qualifying. Norris was presented with the Pirelli Pole Position Award by Belgium's Thierry Neuville, the reigning FIA World Rally Champion, having secured the title at the final round last year in Japan, driving a Pirelli-shod Hyundai. To date, Neuville has taken part in 175 WRC rounds, taking 21 wins and 72 podium finishes.
For the Sprint Race, all drivers with the exception of Colapinto who went with the Softs, ran the Medium tyre. Of the Medium runners, eight used new sets while 11 ran sets used for a qualifying run. The C3 behaved as expected, with significant but not excessive degradation. On the C4, the Argentinian was able to run the medium length stint with degradation not too dissimilar to that seen on its harder sibling. For qualifying, all drivers used the Soft, again except for Colapinto, who did his first Q1 run on the Medium. In Q1, 12 drivers ran used C4s.
Mario Isola: "A very busy Saturday as is always the case on a Sprint weekend. From the short race, we were able to gather plenty of useful information on how the Medium tyre, used by the great majority of drivers, behaved. Degradation was a factor, obviously as this track is very hard on tyres, but it definitely wasn't dramatic, especially as there was no graining, something we had already realised in yesterday's free practice.
"As for strategy, the first thing to take into consideration is that the forecast is for a high chance of rain. Therefore the hypothetical scenarios are many, in every sense of the word. If it's a dry race with track temperatures significantly lower than today's or yesterday's, the Soft and Medium compounds will be the most competitive. As there is not that big a difference between a one-stop and a two-stop, any combination of Soft and Medium is possible. That doesn't mean the decision to bring a very hard Hard here was a mistake: if we had kept the same trio as last year, the one-stop would have been significantly quicker. One must also bear in mind that overtaking at this track is not that easy, as could be seen in all today's Sprint races, in F1, F2 and F3, when trains of cars were formed despite or indeed because of the DRS. This means that the start, and especially the first sector on the opening lap, should make the difference and slipstreaming could play an important role.
"If the race starts in the dry, but with the threat of rain, one can easily imagine the Medium would be the favourite compound so as to have greater flexibility in managing the moment to switch to rain tyres or to extend the first stint as much as possible."
